Enermax MAXPRO 500w Power Supply Review
Peter Donnell / 9 years ago
Final Thoughts
Pricing
I actually got to this part of the review without knowing the price of the Enermax MAXPRO 500W. I knew it would be cheaper thanks to the budget packaging, non-modular design and lower wattage, but I didn’t expect it to be as extremely affordable as it is! You can pick up the MAXPRO 500 from a few reputable retailers, including Lambdatek for just £41.95. Readers in the US may have to check with their own retailer of choice, as we couldn’t find stock at the time of writing outside of the EU.
Conclusion
I’m very impressed with the MAXPRO 500W power supply. If I had to judge it on first looks, I may have dismissed it quite quickly, but the performance figures speak for themselves. The hard-wired cables are hardly visually appealing, they’re about as standard as you could expect from a budget PSU, then there’s the brown box packaging, the low-wattage and the budget price; all these things usually indicate lower performance. Of course, I would have been utterly wrong, as the performance was nothing short of exceptional.
The voltage regulation is fantastic, very tight across the whole range and easily on par with much more expensive units. The ripple suppression is far better than I would have expected, the PFC is very good and even the efficiency performed higher than expected. In short, this PSU far exceeded my expectations and that’s certainly no bad thing. For a unit of this price, it runs reasonably efficient, delivers consistent and clean power, the fan is quiet and it’s so cheap, you would be a fool to look at anything else in this price range for this wattage.
There really is little else to say about this unit, it doesn’t look anything special, it’s certainly affordable, but the performance is superb, making this one of the best budget friendly units on the market!
Pros
- Excellent voltage regulation
- Good PFC
- Virtually silent performance
- Durable build quality
- High-quality 120mm fan
- Virtually silent performance
- Very low ripple
- Budget friendly
Cons
- Not the most visually appealing unit due to hard-wired cables
“Being on a tight budget no longer means you have to settle for second best. The MAXPRO 500 may look like a cheap PSU, but it’s performance is anything but! This would make a great addition to any system where performance is more important than appearance.”
Thank you Enermax for providing this review sample.